The key to my 2001 New Beetle broke off the remote housing a couple days ago. The RFID chip and radio inside the remote were fine, so I ordered up a replacement housing on Amazon. After following instructions on YouTube to carefully swap the internals, I found that the buttons on the new remote didn’t appear to lock/unlock the vehicle, nor was the RFID being acknowledged by the vehicle. Ironically, my backup master key/remote would also no longer lock/unlock the vehicle, so I figured something else was going on.

As recommended by VW, I reset the non-working remote by following page 31 of the manual. For those that don’t have it handy:

1. Press either the lock or unlock button on the non-working remote one time for one second.
2. Lock or unlock the vehicle with the master key (non-working remote).

The non-working remote should now be able to lock/unlock doors! Repeat as necessary for additional non-working remotes. I also started the vehicle and the RFID appeared to be acknowledged, as it was no longer tripping the vehicle’s security system as indicated by the dashboard.